St. Hedwig's Cathedral

Reviews

Joseph Noussair

The sanctuary takes an “in the round form” which is in fact a modern post-war renovation which seems well adapted to the original building design. More stark, spare, beautiful, and effective 20th century modernism can be seen in the castings and plaques in the lower level chapels. It will seem reminiscent of Scandinavian modernist craft.
It needs to be understood that all of this work took place in the time of the DDR when the regime was trying to intimidate church flocks out of existence. I remember vividly that in St. Hedwigs on Sundays, men in ill-fitting leather jackets, the de-rigeur garb of the times’ government thugs and flunkies, with little understanding of the course of the mass, would sit in the last row and photograph people.
Knowing this, the people who attended mass defiantly exhibited no fear.
Some Sunday in 1982, I remember that I got so annoyed by these men that I remained standing while the parishoners were seated, knowing that it would grate on the identity-gathering VoPo or Stasi men sitting right behind me.
Today, we can forget about all of that, and can report that one can exercise faith freely. Attending a youth mass there recently, hearing the beautiful music the kids were making, I thought about how wonderful it is that they never had to know what it was once like.